Asian Session Forex Recap – Mar. 21, 2016

Article Highlights

New Zealand Westpac consumer sentiment down from 110.7 to 109.6 in Q4 2015

New Zealand visitor arrivals down by 1.6% vs. 2.7% uptick in January

U.K. Rightmove house price index up by 1.3% vs. 2.9% rise in February

New Zealand credit card spending rises by 7.3% vs. 8.3% increase in January

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Ho-hum. Forex price action was limited during the Asian session, thanks to a lack of catalysts and a bank holiday in Japan.

Major Events:

Weekend news – With Japan on a bank holiday and with no major news report on tap, Asian session traders decided to focus on news received over the weekend. More specifically, a warning from People’s Bank of China (PBoC) Governor Zhou Xiaochuan about debts being too high compared to China’s GDP put a cap on the comdolls’ gains.

Meanwhile, the pound gapped lower at the start of the day over senior cabinet minister Iain Duncan resigning over the weekend. Word around the hood is that he’s not too happy about budget cut negotiations. Not surprisingly, the pound bears attacked at the sign of tension in Prime Minister David Cameron’s leadership. And it’s so close to the Brexit vote, too!

New Zealand data – Forex traders don’t usually pay much attention to lower tier reports from New Zealand, but today its Westpac consumer sentiment and visitor arrivals releases got some attention.

The former showed a decline from 110.7 to 109.6 in Q4 2015, while the net rise in visitor arrivals was less than its figures last month. Not exactly stellar numbers especially when you consider that the RBNZ had recently (and surprisingly) cut its rates in preparation for weaker inflation.

Major Currency Movers:

USD – The Greenback’s price action was a mixed bag of nut, as it lost out to some of its counterparts early in the day but soon recovered a few hours before the session paused for a break.

EUR/USD rose to a session high of 1.1285 before settling down to 1.1269, USD/JPY dropped to 111.23 before climbing back to 111.46, and GBP/USD reached 1.4468 before it slid to 1.4443.

Comdolls – Weaker-than-expected news from New Zealand, concern for China, and overall risk aversion pushed the commodity-related currencies lower against the dollar.

Every day, I will present to you my findings and daily commentaries on what recently happened in the economic arena, possible shifts in sentiment, economic events to watch out for, and their effects on currencies.

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